Taiwan’s Ting Yi “Eric” Tsai has won the King’s 60K Super High Rollerthe most expensive event of the KPC Poker October Series, taking down a stacked field in Jeju, South Korea for a career-best $1,046,600. The result marks the first seven-figure score of Tsai’s live tournament career and caps off a festival that produced the largest prize pool of the series to that point.
A Record Night at LES A Casino
The King’s 60K Super High Roller was staged at LES A Casino on Jeju Island, the venue that has turned the South Korean resort island into one of Asia’s busiest stops for high-stakes poker over the past several years. Event #31 of the KPC Poker October Series drew 66 entries, a strong turnout for a $60,000 buy-in, and generated a total prize pool of $3,706,600, the biggest of the festival at the time it concluded. Only the top nine finishers were paid, with the payouts dropping steeply after the money bubble, which meant every elimination at the final table carried significant financial weight.
The field brought together some of the circuit’s most recognizable traveling pros, including American grinders, Japanese high-stakes regulars and a deep contingent of Taiwanese players chasing a marquee title on home turf in Asia. Jeju has hosted several marquee series in recent years, including Triton Poker’s Super High Roller Series and the King Poker Cup, both of which Poker Pro Academy has covered extensively, and the King’s 60K slots into that same tradition of the island drawing the game’s deepest-pocketed players for short, high-variance festivals.
Nakai’s Early Lead Fades, Girard’s Comeback Steals the Show
Japan’s Ryuta Nakai arrived at the final table with the chip lead, but his stack eroded steadily as the day wore on, and he was eliminated in fifth place for $300,000 once the shorter stacks around him managed to connect. The most dramatic storyline of the final table, however, belonged to France’s Hugues Girard, who had been reduced to a single 25,000 chip during Day 2 of the tournament. Rather than busting immediately, Girard survived that precarious spot and rebuilt all the way to a final table seat, arriving with 175,000 chips, the shortest stack among the nine players left. From there he won six consecutive all-in confrontations, a run that carried him from the brink of elimination to a third-place finish worth $470,000, one of the more remarkable comebacks the KPC Poker October Series produced this year.
Behind Girard, Morocco’s Mehdi Chaoui took fourth for $370,000, while the other min-cashers at the table included Lithuania’s Marius Kudzmanas, American Ethan Yau, Austria’s Manuel Martin Fritz and Taiwan’s Candy Lin, giving the final nine a genuinely international flavor that reflected the tournament’s pull on the Asian and European high-stakes scenes alike.
Tsai Turns the Heads-Up Match Around
When the final table reached heads-up play, American pro Calvin Lee held a small chip advantage over Tsai, and for a stretch of hands it looked as though Lee might carry that edge to the title. The momentum shifted when Tsai completed a full house and moved all-in on the river; Lee, unable to make the call, folded and surrendered the chip lead for the first time in the match.
The two players then got all their chips in the middle on what proved to be the final hand of the tournament. Lee shoved with pocket jacks, while Tsai made the call holding king-jack offsuit, a race that favored Lee going to the flop. The board ran out 4-Q-10-7-9, missing Lee’s set draw entirely but delivering Tsai a queen-high straight on the river to seal the title. Lee was left to settle for the runner-up prize of $700,000, still a career-shaping score in his own right, while Tsai claimed both the trophy and the headline payday.
Full King’s 60K Super High Roller Final Table Results
1st: Ting Yi “Eric” Tsai (Taiwan), $1,046,600
2nd: Calvin Lee (USA), $700,000
3rd: Hugues Girard (France), $470,000
4th: Mehdi Chaoui (Morocco), $370,000
5th: Ryuta Nakai (Japan), $300,000
6th: Marius Kudzmanas (Lithuania), $240,000
7th: Ethan Yau (USA), $190,000
8th: Manuel Martin Fritz (Austria), $150,000
9th: Candy Lin (Taiwan), $120,000
What the Win Means for Tsai
Beyond the trophy, the win represents a milestone moment in Tsai’s career: his first seven-figure cash in live tournament poker, achieved at one of the toughest buy-in levels on the Asian high-stakes calendar. Tsai was visibly emotional after the final hand and dedicated the victory to his wife, a personal touch that resonated with the crowd gathered around the final table. For a player who had built a reputation as a capable high-stakes grinder without previously breaking through for a result of this size, the King’s 60K title instantly becomes the headline result of his résumé and a springboard for bigger buy-ins going forward.
For the KPC Poker October Series as a whole, the event also reinforced Jeju’s standing as a destination series capable of attracting serious international fields even at nosebleed buy-ins, a trend players looking to build their own tournament résumés can study by brushing up on fundamentals like the poker hand rankings that decided Tsai’s title-winning straight on the river.
Poker Pro Academy will continue tracking the King’s and KPC Poker brands as they expand their presence across Asia’s high-stakes circuit. As always, tournament poker carries significant financial risk even for seasoned professionals, and players are reminded that poker should be treated as entertainment rather than a guaranteed source of income. Play 18+ and responsibly.
